The Bad Boys of Baby Names

Tiny Trends

The Bad Boys of Baby Names

Girls love bad boys, now parents do too

-Pamela Redmond Satran and Linda Rosenkrantz

Baby names are definitely a hot topic, and not only among parents and parents-to-be. When it comes to baby names, everyone has an opinion. At nameberry.com, we keep a close eye on worldwide trends, and one we’ve noticed recently – spearheaded by celebrities but spreading to others – is a growing use of bad boy names. These wild and wooly, aggressive choices – a posse of Bandits, Rebels and Rogues – raise all kinds of questions about the limits of extreme baby naming.

The other day, we heard tell of a little boy named Vandal. And then, the next day, one of the band members of My Chemical Romance named his newborn daughter (yes, daughter) Bandit.

Are these parents masochistic? Gang members? Or do they just love the idea of launching a bad boy (or girl) into the world?

Vandal and Bandit aren’t the only hellions in the nursery these days. There’s Breaker, one of the seven children of Robert and Cortney Novogratz, hipster parents who own Sixx Design in New York. Then there are Racer, Rebel, Rocket, and Rogue, sons of film director Robert Rodriguez. (Survival tip: If you’re invited to dinner at their house, wear a helmet.)

The trends toward word names, surnames and occupational names have certainly fueled this trend. If Cooper can be a name, after all, why not Cutter? If Porter, why not Power?

While the popularity list is full of newborns named Heaven, Nevaeh, and Angel, it also features a growing number of babies with these less-than-angelic names: